Aspects of biological evolution based on molecular data sets

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General relationships of mammalian orders and evolutionary development of primates inferred from best-fit α-globin phylogenies

A best-fit α-globin phylogeny was identified by means of a global minimization approach from among the topologies generated by a parsimony strategy. Zip parsimony method was used to derive a set of near-parsimonious trees. For each of these topologies, a difference matrix was computed; and the topology with the best goodness of fit with the original matrix was retained as the best tree. Based on this phylogenetic scheme inter-relationships among eutherian orders and the evolutionary development of primates has been discussed

Book Review “The Tkt Course Clil Module”

The aim of this book is to provide teachers and trainee teachers with a guide on how best to improve teaching knowledge through an additional module, tagged: CLIL – Content and Language Integrated Learning. The volume is particularly relevant to both teachers who teach different curricular subjects through the medium of English and English language teachers who use curriculum content in their teaching. The book is centrally focused on the fact that Teaching Knowledge Test TKT and Content and Language Integrated Learning CLIL, play a significant role in helping both the trainer and students to achieve success in short term learning outcomes. As a module for development of trainers, the course covers four key areas: (i)               Knowledge and principles of CLIL (ii)             Lesson preparation (iii)           Lesson delivery, and (iv)            Assessment   The units underscore the usefulness of the TKT: CLIL theory and practice to all teachers and learners working with English as an additional language – the challenges of the bridge period   between L1 and L2 and in other circumstances where English is used for specific purposes. Divided into two parts of seventeen units, the book begins with an introduction that explains both the content and the target of TKT: CLIL. As a preamble to the module, the introduction further presents objectives and most specifically the theoretical concepts guiding the entire course – ‘how each unit is organized and how it can be used’. To achieve this, the author prescribes an extensive use of TKT: CLIL glossary not contained in the book though essential to ELT – English Language Teaching

Indexicals in Television News Broadcast

This work investigated the use of indexicals in television news broadcast. Indexicals are expressive words that signal the appropriate use of information in text. They serve to point to objects, personalities and ideas particularly in television news broadcast. This paper therefore aimed at examining the characteristic indexicals used as text creating linguistic features in news broadcast. The corpus for the study consists of news bulletins of TV Gotel, Yola, Adamawa State- Nigeria. Four bulletins broadcasted within the month of August, 2012, were randomly selected from the television. The method of data analysis was descriptive. The findings show that indexicals are significant features of television news broadcast. Pronoun indexicals point at personalities and topics, while adjectives describe events, and adverbs point at times and manners in which such events occur. The paper, suggests that practicing journalists and students of mass communication should be encouraged to use indexicals as they write, report and cast news over the television. Key words: indexicals, bulletins, news broadcast, deixis

Effective Processing Methods on Intresinc Quality of Sidama and Yirgacheffee Coffee Types

Coffee quality can be affected by variety, climate and soil factor, field management practices and post-harvest handling and processing techniques. Arabica coffee (Coffee arabica L.) is an economically important crop, which is contributing the highest of all export revenues in Ethiopia. The study was undertaken in Dilla zuria and Yirgacheffee districts, representing the known Sidama Yirgacheffee coffee brands, respectively, in South National Nationalities Peoples’ Regional State. The objective of study were to examine the effect of methods of processing on intrinsic quality of Sidama and Yirgacheffee coffees and to identified the best methods of processing that can keep the inherent quality of coffee landrace of Sidama and Yirgacheffee specialty coffee .For this, fully ripe red cherries were hand collected from local coffee types . The harvested cherries were separately study under three processing methods (washed, semi-washed and sundried) at the two locations. In each case the treatment arranged in factorial experiment in completely randomized design with three replication. Data on intrinsic quality (acidity, body, flavour and cup quality) were recorded .The result indicated acidity, body, flavour and cup quality were significantly different due to methods of processing at both sites. Among the processing method the wet processing resulted in the superior coffee qualities as compared to others at the two study areas. In addition, most quality traits significantly differ due to the interaction effects arising from location and processing method. The result finding also demonstrated that Yirgacheffee coffee was better than Sidama coffee types in terms of raw quality attributes, possibility due to positively effect of increased altitude in terms of quality attribute. The present findings would help at a small measure, on optimum processing practices to be applied at each locality and thus improve the inherent quality of Sidama and Yirgacheffee specialty coffees as the faces of increasing market demand for best coffee type. Nonetheless further repeated studies should be undertaken by taking into account among other the present physical and sensory attributes, other compounds and biochemical constitutes (caffeine, sugar. Etc.) With view of mapping the quality profile off Sidama and Yirgacheffe coffees grown under the various site and environmental conditions

Evolutionary trends in the hemoglobins of murine animals

The evolutionary origin of murine line based on a phylogenetic tree made on sequence data of ∞- and β -hemoglobin chains, followed by the diversity spectrum of hemoglobin genes in two wild species of murine rodents: Rattus rattus rufescens (house rat) and Bandicota indica (bandicoot rat) has been reported. Each house rat contains six hemoglobin types involving two infinity-and three β-chains, which suggests a probable gene duplication at the oc chain locus and a gene triplication at the β-chain locus. Each bandicoot rat contains one infinity-and two β -chains suggesting a probable gene duplication at the β-chain locus. Peptide pattern analysis of the polypeptide chains of these murine hemoglobins further indicates that intraspecies differences among duplicated chains of the same kind are less than interspecies differences among corresponding ∞-and β -chains

Causal Effect of Financial Market Frictions and Flight to Quality on Cost of Credit in Kenya

Financial market conditions have been declining over the past ten years globally as most developing countries continue to adopt more liberal financial policies, such conditions may amplify adverse shocks to the economy. The Kenyan Banking sector was highly profitable before the implementation of financial market frictions, with industry return on equity’s average of 20%. The ratio of credit supply to gross domestic product was 35%; and the economy grew by 5.6 %. Nonetheless, after its adoption, listed Banks recorded negative Earnings per Share growth of 8.2%, compared to an average positive growth of 14.1%, The Net Interest Margin declined to 8.4% from 9.4%. Studies relating to financial market frictions, flight to quality and Cost of Credit have produced mixed results. It was on this basis that this study sought to establish the effect of financial market frictions and flight to quality on cost of credit in Kenya. The study adopted correlational research design. Secondary data from the Kenyan Market for the period January 2009 to December 2019 was analyzed. Augmented Dickey Fuller and Philips-perron unit-root test was used to test the stationarity of the data. VECM was estimated to establish the speed of adjustment towards the long run equilibrium; Wald statistics was also estimated to establish short run causalities amongst the variables. Based on cointegrating equations, the error correction term indicated a negative sign and was significant at 5% level (C (1) = -0.153042, .0429 < 0.05), an indication that a long run relationship exists amongst the variables. Wald statistics revealed that the estimated coefficients in the VECM were insignificantly different from zero (.8417; .5603; .9188>p=0.05),however, Central Bank rate was found to be different from zero and significant at 5% level (.0163>p=0.05), an indication that there was a short run casualty running from the Central Bank rate to cost of credit. The study therefore recommends that for Micro finance institutions to maximize their profits they should adopt new technologies like Mobile Banking for their credit facilities, this does not require administrative and operation costs, in a bid to cope with the market shocks and frictions. Keywords: Financial Market Frictions, Flight to Quality, Cost of Credit, Kenya DOI: 10.7176/JESD/12-6-07 Publication date:March 31st 202

Evaluation of Sediment Yield Predicting Models of Ghana

Fluvial sediment transport data is a very important data for effective water resource management. However, acquiring this data is expensive and tedious hence sediment yield modeling has become an alternative approach in estimating river sediment yields. In Ghana, several sediment yield predicting models have been developed to estimate the sediment yields of ungauged rivers including the Pra River Basin. In this paper, 10 months sediment yield data of the Pra River Basin was used to evaluate the existing sediment yield predicting models of Ghana. A regression analysis between predicted sediment yield data derived from the models and the observed suspended sediment yields of the Pra Basin was done to determine the extent of estimation of observed sediment yields. The prediction of suspended sediment yield was done for 4 out of 5 existing sediment yield predicting models in Ghana. There were variations in sediment yield between observed and predicted suspended sediments. All predicted sediment yields were lower than observed data except for equation 3 where the results were mixed. All models were found to be good estimators of fluvial sediments with the best model being equation 4. Sediment yield tends to increase with drainage basin area.